Are Your Friends Making You Fat? — The role of social circles in behavioral adaptations. Some thinking in here that reflects my observation that cancer is a social disease. Gives me a lot to consider about social networks, too. FYI, headline is very misleading, the article is about much more than implied. (Thanks to .)

‘Party of Parasites’ author took $1M in farm subsidies — Ah, that famed intellectual consistency of the conservative movement. Somebody please explain to me why it’s welfare when somebody else gets the money, but a vital government program when a conservative gets the money?

Lessons of Petraeus’ Iraq for Petraeus’ Afghanistan — It is frequently asserted that Gen. Petraeus “succeeded” in Iraq via a troop escalation or “surge” of 30,000 extra US troops that he dedicated to counter-insurgency purposes in al-Anbar and Baghdad Provinces. […] But it would be a huge mistake to see Iraq either as a success story or as stable. See also Daniel Larison’s remarks, which I think I largely agree with.